1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to systems and methods for managing and sharing information related to assembly projects. More particularly, the invention relates to electronic systems and methods for facilitating selecting, specifying and procuring items related to assembly projects using an electronic taxonomy for organizing, communicating and sharing information between potentially disparate software applications.
2. Description of Related Art
Of all the types of data exchanged between parties involved in construction, product information constitutes the largest volume. Construction is made of physical things and all of the preliminaries like drawings, estimates, and specifications, are only required because we need to incorporate physical things into an actual built project. Unfortunately, attempts to standardize the organization and presentation of product information have mostly failed because there are so many manufacturers and they are reluctant to allow third-party organizations to control their data. In addition, there is an intimidation factor involved; namely, the hundreds of thousands of products on the market generate a definite perception in the industry that organizing product information is too overwhelming a project.
The principal processes that use product information are product selecting, specifying, and procuring. For a particular product, the product selecting and specifying processes are commonly repeated successively, starting during the design process, by people with different roles, until the actual point of procurement.
1. Selecting Products: The process by which a person chooses the product appropriate for a particular application, resulting in a match of requirements to properties; an iterative process, in which requirements are commonly modified based on available properties.
2. Specifying Products: The process of documenting requirements. The result is usually referred to as a specification, not to be confused with manufacturers"" xe2x80x9cspecificationsxe2x80x9d that describe the actual properties of their products.
3. Procuring Products: The process of acquiring real, physical products required for construction, repair, or replacement.
Selecting, specifying, and procuring products are processes integral to all phases of design, documentation, construction, and operation of projects. Most existing software applications designed specifically for the construction industry were developed because of the need to manipulate product information in some way. Because product information is so important, any method of information exchange that does not address it will ultimately fail because there is little use in the ability to exchange information about a project if one cannot actually exchange the information needed to select, specify, and buy the products necessary to build it.
A problem is that many players in the industry use different terminology to describe the same products and properties, even those who are actually speaking the same language. As long as product information communication employs xe2x80x9cuser-definedxe2x80x9d terms, there will be insufficient standardization to communicate with precision, and without precision computer communication is useless. Even when computers are not used, the use of different terminology reduces the accuracy and efficiency of the communication significantly.
So far, none of the standardization or integration efforts have dealt with products and their properties in detail. The most prevalent taxonomy in the U.S. construction industry, MASTERFORMAT, covers product names only; it is widely used for arranging product catalogs, specifications, and cost estimates because it is relatively simple to use. The second most commonly used taxonomy, UNIFORMAT, covers built elements only and is a hierarchical classification mostly used for arranging cost estimates and early stage building descriptions. Some European systems improve on these classification efforts by establishing separate classifications for different types of things, including facilities, built elements, products, materials, and properties. The CI/Sfb (U.K.) and its successor UNICLASS were designed to be human-readable but are more like an electronic taxonomy and, as a result, have been little used because they are so complex. Further, the IAI Project Model (Ifc""s) does not represent products in any significant detail, although much work has been done on modeling built elements, particularly from the design and drawing point of view. However, there are no known software applications that facilitate communication of product property information using existing taxonomies.
The present invention provides systems and methods for identifying and organizing construction product information in such a way that product data sets can be readily defined and recorded, quickly searched and compared, and accurately transmitted among software applications and translated into the form needed without the need for human intervention or interpretation. These systems and methods involve a taxonomy specifically designed for computer rather than human use, with software applications providing a human-readable interface and output documents.
A typical environment will include a common taxonomy to provide standardized communication. The taxonomy uses a common set of terms including element names representing items and item categories and criteria associated with given elements. A common data structure is used to store elements across disparate criteria; this common data structure will include a portion of the structure to store information related to specific criteria associated with a given element. In many embodiments, this portion preferably includes the following fields: criteria name, criteria value, units of measure and method of observation. The taxonomy is typically organized hierarchically. In one embodiment, a particular taxonomy may be used within a construction project for communicating information related to construction elements such as built-elements, built-element categories, products product categories, spaces within constructed facilities, constructed facilities and the relevant criteria associated with any of these elements.
In certain embodiments, the taxonomy is maintained by a centralized authority, which may provide updates to users of the taxonomy on a periodic or on demand basis. The taxonomy may be initially created based by the authority using industry standards accepted in the given assembly industry. In other embodiments, the taxonomy may be further developed through the provision to item manufacturers or brokers or other developers of information related to items in the given assembly industry of an indexing program with a current taxonomy and allowing the development and submission extension of the taxonomy by individual indexers of item information.
Many embodiments use a hierarchical criteria interface to view, select and insert element information. Such an interface might, in one embodiment, appear in a manner similar to the example hierarchy seen in FIG. 1. In such an interface, the various elements (e.g. 210, 220, 225, 230, 235, 240, 245, 250) and criteria representing properties (e.g. 255, 265) would be selectable. Selection of an element would cause the display of the elements names that are below the selected element in the hierarchy and criteria associated with the selected element. For example, assuming FIG. 1 represented a sample hierarchical criteria interface, selection of xe2x80x9cGypsum Panel Finishxe2x80x9d 240 triggers display of criteria/values 265, 270 and elements xe2x80x9cWall Type 1xe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cWall Type 2xe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cWall Type 3xe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cWall Type 4xe2x80x9d. Selection of a criterion would allow the designation of a particular value associated with the selected criteria; the designation could be by any appropriate input mechanism such as a text entry area for direct entry of a value or a menu of selectable values.
One embodiment of the present invention encompasses a virtual product library wherein item information from disparate item manufacturers or brokers or other developers of information related to items in the given assembly industry can be integrated into a common environment that may facilitate selection, specification and procurement of items related to a specific assembly project. An indexing program can be distributed to relevant sources of item information that allow the particular source to submit their respective item information in a manner compliant with the taxonomy. This indexing program, in certain embodiments, is the same indexing program discussed above with respect to the development of the taxonomy. The distributed indexing program can index relevant item information according to the taxonomy and submit the generated indexes to the virtual product library environment for searching and procuring by relevant user communities. The indexes from the various sources can be integrated into a single common index spanning items described across the disparate item information sources. Upon receipt of a query that typically includes an element name and a set of desired criteria, the virtual library environment can search the common index for items meeting the specified query. The results of this search can be presented to the originator of the query. The results can be formatted in a variety of manners depending upon the intended mode of presentation to the originator of the query. In preferred embodiments, the above-described hierarchical interface may be used for generating the initial query, presenting the results of the search or both.
In another embodiment, disparate assembly project related applications can be used to select and specify items related to a given assembly project. Typically, each such application will maintain a distinct data store of project related data in an application specific format. A centralized link manager according to the present invention can support centralized organization of item information related to the project. Typically, such a link manager may read item information created by the disparate applications either directly from such applications or indirectly from an application specific data store associated with each such application. The link manager organizes such received or retrieved item information according to the taxonomy. The link manager may in certain embodiments create a project data store for storing the item information in a centralized, taxonomy compliant manner. In preferred embodiments, the link manager compares the item information organized according to the taxonomy from the disparate application to identify matching and mismatching item information. The matching and mismatching item information is then displayed to the end user. In one embodiment, the presentation is via the hierarchical display discussed above. The end user may be afforded an opportunity to resolve mismatching information and provide additional data regarding matching or mismatching items after the information is displayed; in such embodiments, the resolving or additional data may be used to update various data stores associated with the project including a centralized project data store and/or various application specific data stores.
Additional advantages of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by means of the elements and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims. It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed.